


As Lucky as Lucky Can Be

by Snickfic



Series: Until the Wind Changes [2]
Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Kissing, M/M, Pittsburgh Penguins, Polyamory Negotiations, Romance, background Sid/Geno
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-25
Updated: 2017-09-25
Packaged: 2019-01-05 08:12:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,854
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12186246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snickfic/pseuds/Snickfic
Summary: It wasn’t really fair. It wasn’t fair that Geno was so hot, that his skating was so great, that he looked at Olli sometimes with such intent focus. Geno belonged to Sid, and Olli was just a kid he was keeping entertained.





	As Lucky as Lucky Can Be

**Author's Note:**

> Huge thanks to my betas, Irrealis and saintroux.

Geno didn’t walk in hangdog and sheepish about the colossally stupid shot block that had brought him here. He strode into the press box like he owned it. His hair was gelled stiff, his legs miles long in his blue dress pants – not that Olli noticed shit like that. Geno surveyed the box with a casually possessive eye, and then, to Olli’s considerable surprise, he dropped into the next seat over. “How’s hand?” Geno asked.

Olli turned his palm up. The cast was off now, but the bone was still healing and a little tender, and Olli was absolutely forbidden from taking any shots, much less contact. So here he was in the press box, still. Again. “Getting there,” he said.

Geno cast a judgmental eye on the hand, like it’d shape up under the force of his glare. Then the judgment shifted to Olli’s chips and fake cheese in their little cardboard boat. “Terrible nachos. Why you eat?”

“Uh—”

Geno grabbed a nacho and stuck it in his mouth. He caught Olli’s stare. Still chewing, he said, “What you look at? Watch game.” He pointed to the empty ice. It was ten minutes until the anthem, still.

Olli waited thirty seconds or so, and then he said, “Wow, did you see that pass?”

Geno glanced at the ice, and then he squinted at Olli. “What pass?”

Olli gestured towards the offensive zone. “Schultzy to Shears, saucer pass. Tape-to-tape. You didn’t see it?” When Geno continued to look baffled, edging towards suspicion, Olli added, “You told me to watch the game.”

After a beat, the light dawned. “You’re little shit,” Geno said, with something like admiration.

Olli’s chest warmed dangerously.  


* * *

  
The next time Olli went out for his solo pre-practice skate around, Geno was there. His eyes lit when they landed on Olli. “One lap sprint, go!” He was off before Olli had even properly heard the words.

Olli took off after him and lost miserably. “Not fair, you cheated.”

“I’m never do,” Geno said, eyes huge and shocked. “What, you think with head start, you beat me?”

“I don’t need a _head start_ ,” Olli said.

He lost again. 

“Slow legs,” Geno said, tsking in disappointment. “So Finn.”

Olli pointedly ignored this typical Russian slander of his homeland and bent over his knees, trying to catch his breath.

“Max give you exercise? Things for practice skating?”

“Some,” Olli said grudgingly. He noticed that Max seemed to feel no need to give _Geno_ specialized skating exercises. The fact that Geno was a superstar and Olli was only a mediocre stay-at-home defenseman with one outlier season under his belt did not soothe his feelings.

“You do with Max, then we go again,” Geno said. He slapped at the backs of Olli’s calves with his stick. “There he is, get ready for you. Go, go!”

Olli went, a little less grudging and a little more determined. All through the drill, he felt Geno’s attention on him. It made heat prickle across the back of his neck. It gave him ideas – stupid ones, for a hundred million reasons that started and ended with Sid. Because Geno was Sid’s, and everyone knew it.  


* * *

  
“Guentzy scoring tonight,” Geno said, sitting down next to Olli. Geno had brought a pretzel tonight. He might as well just eat one of the cardboard boats, in Olli’s opinion.

“You say that every game,” Olli said.

“And every game I’m right,” Geno said. He bit into the pretzel and made a face, and then he began brushing salt grains off. “What you do your hair?”

“Uh.” Alarmed, Olli ran a hand over his head. It felt normal. “Nothing?”

Geno narrowed his eyes. “Longer, get cut? Look good.”

“Oh, uh. Thanks?” Olli gave Geno a hard look, waiting for the punch line, but Geno was de-salting his pretzel with renewed concentration. He looked—a little red? But that was obviously just a trick of the light. Two minutes later the flush was gone, and Geno was crowing about the superiority of Russian blini over the Finnish kind, smug as shit.  


* * *

  
The rest of the team went away to play hockey games. “You want go to dinner?” Geno asked casually in the shower, after he and Olli had taken their morning skate. “New place downtown, look fancy. My treat.”

“Sure,” Olli said, because he might be on a new contract now, but that didn’t mean he was going to turn down free steak. 

That word _fancy_ stuck in his head, though. When he got dressed that evening, he put on a nice button-down shirt and styled his hair. There was a fizz of excitement in his belly that seemed entirely unwarranted, and yet. Then Geno picked Olli up in his superstar-athlete sports car, and Olli was suddenly very glad he’d taken the extra minutes to look, well. Fancy. 

The lighting of the place felt expensive. They ordered steaks and chose wine – well, Geno chose his wine and Olli took the waitress’s recommendation. Then somehow, over salad, Olli was teaching Geno Finnish swears.

“Kyrpä,” Geno repeated carefully. His consonants were still thick and congested-sounding, but getting better each time.

“Or _Voi kyrpä_ , it’s like—” Olli glanced around and dropped his voice. “—like _Oh, fuck_.”

“Mmm. Voi kyrpä.”

There were only so many times Olli could hear those kinds of words in Geno’s distinctive rumble before his own traitorous kyrpä started to sit up and take an interest. “Or _kyrpä otsassa_. It means you’re, like, really pissed off?”

Geno dutifully repeated the phrase a couple of times, and then he said, “So what’s mean _otsassa_?”

Olli blinked a moment. “It’s your forehead. _Kyrpä otsassa_ means you have a dick on your forehead.” 

That rescued him from the dangerous moment, because Geno spent the next five minutes laughing until he cried. “Like dick unicorn,” he said, wheezing, and Olli wasn’t even going to imagine where Geno could have picked up that particular bit of vocabulary.

On their way out the door, Geno’s knuckles brushed against Olli’s, and a cold quiver of want ran through Olli. But that was ridiculous; Geno was only hanging out with Olli because he was bored. Because he missed Sid, probably.

It wasn’t really fair, Olli thought at home that night. It wasn’t fair that Geno was so hot, that his skating was so great, that he looked at Olli sometimes with such intent focus. Geno belonged to Sid, and Olli was just a kid he was keeping entertained.

It wasn’t fair that the only guys on the team who could ever swing Olli’s way were instead so inextricably bound up in each other that Olli never stood a chance.  


* * *

  
Olli walked into the box cranky. Geno was already there with a pretzel _and_ nachos. Maybe he’d finally decided to get his own nachos instead of sneaking them individually from Olli. Olli took the seat next to Geno’s out of habit, and Geno was halfway to a smirk before he saw Olli’s face. “What’s wrong?”

Olli glanced around. Half the beats were still loitering out in the corridor, and the others seemed focused on their laptops or their phones. Olli dropped his voice. “I talked to the trainers. I still can’t play for like, a long time.”

“But you look good in skate.”

“They looked at my hand today.” Olli hadn’t really followed the discussion; he didn’t even remember how much longer they said he’d be out for, because the answer was still _not yet_. “Fuck.” He leaned on his elbows and bowed his head. “Maybe I’m like Beau. Maybe I’m just always going to be stuck up here.”

After a few beats, a hand fell heavily on the back of Olli’s neck and squeezed. Olli waited for Geno to tell him to suck it up and stop feeling sorry for himself. 

The words never came. Eventually the hand retreated, the arena lights dimmed, and Olli straightened up to watch the light show. The next time he happened to glance down, Geno’s nachos had relocated themselves in front of Olli.  


* * *

  
On an off day, Geno took Olli to the zoo. That was fun. Geno delighted in dragging Olli around and showing him the animals, which Geno seemed to know little about but enjoyed immensely anyway. They went for sandwiches afterward and then ice cream from a street vendor. Geno refused to let Olli pay for his half of it. They took their cones down to a park bench overlooking the river. It was hidden away in the trees, and the opposite river bank was empty and heavily wooded. 

Geno swallowed the last of his waffle cone. He looked out at the river and said quietly, “You know Sid and me, sometimes we with other people?”

“Uh,” Olli said. He considered the minimum twenty-five other people that accompanied most of his and Sid and Geno’s waking hours. “What?”

Geno sucked in a breath. “I mean, sometimes he see somebody he like, so he date them little while. Or I see somebody I like, I want to date. Sid okay I do this.”

Olli stared. “What?” he repeated. He didn’t even know which part he wanted clarification on. All of it?

“I’m just say, if that something you maybe interest in—I like take you out.” Geno slid Olli a sidelong glance, uncertain in a way that seemed completely out of character. Geno blustered and bullshitted; this was such a bizarre change that it took Olli a moment to really put Geno’s words together.

“You want to date _me_?” Olli’s voice rose a lot of octaves on that last word.

Geno waggled his hand in the air. “Date, other things.” There was absolutely no ambiguity in Geno’s expression about what kind of other things he meant. He sobered and said, “But maybe you don’t like men, or don’t like me, it’s fine, you know? You just say, and I don’t ask you again. We’re just friends.”

Olli stared at the water, unseeing. His face was burning hot, and his thoughts were running circles around him. He felt like he was trying to defend the slot without a stick.

But there was one thing, at least, that he could clear up. “I like men,” Olli said. His heart pounded. It wasn’t entirely a secret – Schultzy and Dumo both knew, and Olli had told Jussi when he’d first gotten to Pittsburgh, but he didn’t go around talking about it. He dared a glance at Geno. “And I like you,” Olli muttered.

Geno broke into a grin, open and bright and hopeful. There was nothing smug in it, and that alone told Olli he was in uncharted waters. “I think before maybe you do.”

Olli couldn’t flush any harder, but he could duck away—from Geno and from the realization of just how fucking obvious he must have been all this time. He flinched in surprise when something touched his chin, but it was only Geno’s hand, cupping Olli’s cheek.

Geno glanced all around them – at the river, empty for the moment, and the placid unpopulated bank opposite – and then, with glacial slowness, he leaned in. Olli’s breath caught. He could see the kiss coming all the way, and yet the touch of Geno’s lips on Olli’s was still a shock. He sat very still, heart pounding, as Geno mouthed at his lips. Finally Geno retreated and looked for Olli’s reaction.

Olli was still stuck a while back. “Sid is okay with this?”

“Yes!” Geno said, wide-eyed and earnest – and probably meaning it? “We talk about, he say I can.”

“You talked about _me_?” Olli asked. He couldn’t decide if he was embarrassed or not. He couldn’t decide how he felt at all.

“Of course,” Geno said, like it was perfectly natural. Maybe it was. These were waters Olli had never ventured into before, and he couldn’t feel the bottom beneath his feet anymore. Maybe it showed, because Geno asked, “You want come to dinner at my house, talk about with Sid?” When Olli still hesitated, Geno said gently, “Or you just say no. It’s okay.”

“I don’t want to say no,” Olli said finally. “I just—I don’t know how this works.”

“Sid explain better than me. He doesn’t bite, I promise. Please, come to dinner?” 

So Olli agreed, with some trepidation, to go to dinner.  


* * *

  
Sid and Geno’s house smelled delicious. Geno guided Olli to the kitchen, and there was Sid stirring a sauce. He wore nice jeans and a polo, so probably not his standard cooking attire, but then what did Olli know? Much too late, Olli realized he was probably intruding on a romantic dinner for two. He fumbled out an apology.

“It’s fine,” Sid said, with an easy smile. “Nice to have you. Geno, you want to get us some wine?”

Geno didn’t so much as offer to take Olli along. He gave Olli an encouraging smile, and then he disappeared down the hall, leaving Olli all alone with Sid. Olli didn’t have the first idea what the fuck he should say. _I want to fuck your boyfriend, is that okay?_ seemed like a bad start.

Sid picked up Olli’s slack. “So, you have fun today?”

That, Olli could answer. “Yeah. He—we went to the zoo.”

Sid smiled at the white sauce. “That sounds about right. Did he show you the bears?”

“They were all asleep. The giraffes were playing outside, though. And we got ice cream.”

“Awesome,” Sid said. The pasta was already in a serving bowl. Sid poured the sauce over it and offered the bowl to Olli. “Set it over on the table, will you? I’ll get the plates.” 

Dutifully Olli delivered the bowl, and he watched Sid bring the plates, and finally into the silence Olli said, “Geno kissed me.”

Sid stilled. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” 

“Did you kiss him back?”

“Kind of.” Sid lifted an eyebrow. Olli couldn’t quite bear to meet his eyes. “He said it was okay with you.” He braced himself, even though at this point Olli couldn’t really believe Geno was lying anymore. He just couldn’t quite believe he was telling the truth, either.

“Yeah. He’s been interested in you for a while. I told him to go for it.”

Olli dared a glance in Sid’s direction. Sid looked so—relaxed. Unsurprised. “I thought he was making that up.”

“He is full of shit,” Sid agreed. “But not about this. Not about the important stuff. And he really likes you.”

Olli flushed fiery hot, like he was fifteen again and someone was teasing him about a crush. The words were different from Sid than from Geno. More real, somehow. Geno might flirt outrageously – and that was what he’d been doing all this time, Olli had finally realized - but Sid said things straight out. “And it’s really okay? It won’t be—weird? For you?”

“Not for me or for Geno. But if it’s too weird for you, it’s okay. Geno will get over it. We’ll be fine.” 

“And it’s not—it wouldn’t—” Olli tried again. “It would be just me and Geno, right? Not me and you. That’s what he said.”

“What, so Geno’s hot enough for you but I’m not?”

“Uh—”

“I’m kidding,” Sid said, chuckling. “And yeah, that’s right. Sometimes I like to hear about what Geno does with his partners. If it’s okay that he shares that with me, I mean.”

Olli tried to imagine himself fucking Geno, and Geno telling Sid about it. Sid knowing all kinds of shit about Olli. Olli sharing Geno with Sid, the way Sid was offering to share Geno with him. Except for the sex parts, maybe; Olli really preferred not to think about Sidney Crosby’s bare ass or anything that might happen to it. “I think—I think that’d be okay.”

“But you’d be with him, not with me.”

Olli nodded. He leaned against the countertop next to Sid and eyed Sid’s hardwood floor. Finally he confessed, “I really like him.” His heart pounded. 

“He’s pretty great,” Sid agreed.  


* * *

  
If Olli had any concerns about being a homewrecker, dinner swept them all away. Geno teased Sid with ridiculous lies, and when Geno wasn’t looking, Sid’s expression grew so very fond. Sometimes he shared it with Olli – a little tentatively, maybe, like he didn’t want to scare Olli away. 

They didn’t leave him out. Geno kept flashing bright, hopeful smiles at Olli in between telling him total bullshit, and Sid included Olli in all the conversation. Still, it couldn’t have been any clearer how much they just _liked_ each other.

Afterwards, Geno volunteered himself and Olli for dishes, and Sid wandered off with a vague mention of game tape. It felt easier to breathe after he was gone, like there was more air in the room. Silently Olli helped Geno carry the dishes into the kitchen, and together they put them in the sink. It reminded Olli of hanging out at Jussi’s his rookie year. It felt like a long time ago.

“You quiet,” Geno said, breaking into Olli’s thoughts.

Olli looked up from the wet pan he’d been holding for a while now. It was supposed to go in the dishwasher, he realized, and hurriedly he slid it in. When he looked for the next one, Geno was still watching him carefully.

Olli didn’t know how to start.

“It’s a lot, see me and Sid?” Geno asked.

“Kind of?”

Geno scowled into the sink. “Maybe dinner too much. I should give you time, not push so hard.”

“I—” Olli began. He cleared his throat and tried again. “I don’t know how you can like Sid so much and still like me, too.”

Geno shrugged helplessly, and of all things, that made Olli feel a little better. He wasn’t the only one who didn’t have all the angles here. “I like—lots. Lots of people. Sid, he’s forever, you know. But I can’t only like one person. It’s like, I feel so much.” Geno spread his hands as if to demonstrate the breadth of his feeling. Then he ducked his head and returned to the dishes. The back of his neck was red.

It took Olli a bit of maneuvering to get the next pan to fit. Afterwards, Geno put the detergent in the little hollow and turned the dishwasher on, and by the time he’d finished, Olli found it made a kind of sense, what Geno had said. “Okay,” Olli said.

Geno stilled. “Okay?”

“I don’t really get it, exactly, but.” Olli shrugged. _But I trust you_ seemed a little much this early into—whatever this was. But it was true. “I don’t know for sure how I’ll feel about it. Maybe I won’t like it? The—sharing. But I want to try.”

Geno stood taller, a kind of cocksureness coming over him. He looked down at Olli as if from on high, rather than from the meager two inches he had on Olli, and there was a gleam in his eye that made Olli’s blood run hot. “Yes?”

“Yes,” Olli breathed. 

He didn’t know how Geno could swagger when there were only two strides between them, but somehow he managed it. He tipped his head and leaned in, less slow than that afternoon on the bench but just as careful, despite the swagger.

Geno, Olli discovered, was really fucking good at kissing. He came in at just the right angle and kissed with just the right amount of spit. Just when Olli thought about wanting more, Geno nipped very gently at Olli’s lip. Olli moaned, too into it to be embarrassed. _Maybe Sid trained him_ , whispered a voice. Now the idea seemed hot. 

Somehow Olli ended up backed against the fridge with Geno’s hands around his face. He was breathing hard, and his dick was heavy in his pants. He had the presence of mind not to hump Geno’s leg – they were in the _kitchen_ , in _Sidney Crosby’s kitchen_ \- but just barely.

Then, to Olli’s keen disappointment, Geno stepped back and dropped his hands. His breathing was harsh, his eyes dark. “Maybe it’s time take you home,” he said. “Maybe—stay?”

“Okay,” Olli said, in case Geno needed encouragement, though judging by the curve of Geno’s crotch, he shouldn’t need _much_ encouragement.

“Maybe,” Geno repeated. “Have to see. Just a minute, I come right back.” He stole a kiss from Olli’s lips and strode away. Olli rested his head against the fridge and waited for his breathing to slow. It took him a good thirty seconds to realize that Geno probably had gone to say goodbye to Sid, and probably Sid had some say about whether or not Geno spent the night.

Olli gave that a few moments’ thought, trying to feel out if it bothered him. He couldn’t muster up any particular feeling about it.

Geno thundered back down the stairs. “We go,” he said, imperious, but his eyes were sparkling, and he laced his fingers through Olli’s.

The air inside the car was charged. Olli shut the door and Geno shot him a hooded, molten glance – the first of many, it turned out, on a trip home that took longer than Olli would ever have dreamed it could. Finally, they pulled into Olli’s apartment complex. Geno followed Olli up the stairs, hot on his heels, and Olli spared a single moment to hope Schultzy was nowhere around to see them and know what was obviously going to happen next. Olli fumbled at the lock, but finally he had the door open. Geno shut it firmly behind him and continued what he’d begun, there in Sid’s kitchen—

_Sidney Crosby’s fucking kitchen_

—by pushing Olli gently into the wall of his hallway and kissing him. Geno’s mouth was hot and wet, and they were well past precision. Olli sucked on Geno’s tongue, and Geno groaned and pressed his hard-on against Olli’s thigh.

“Shit,” Olli gasped. It was real. This was real. 

Geno pulled back just far enough to grin at him, eyes full of heat and something more, something warm and fond and _so much_. It was more than Olli could handle just then, so he angled his body and rolled his hips against Geno. Geno retaliated by reaching between them and squeezing Olli through his jeans.

“You want come in pants, here in hallway?” Geno rumbled.

That—that sounded kind of fucking hot, but— “No?” 

Geno shifted suddenly away. “Good, then you quit tease,” he scolded. His eyes were smiling and he was biting his tongue between his teeth, and Olli _wanted_.

“So what, then?” Olli said, and hoped it made sense.

“You show me bedroom.”

“Okay,” Olli breathed.

For a handful of seconds between the front door and the bedroom, Olli despaired over the take-out containers piled in the kitchen and the clean clothes he had definitely left heaped on his bedroom floor. He had not left his house this morning with the expectation that Evgeni Malkin was going to see the inside of it.

But it made absolutely no difference, because Olli turned around when they reached the bedroom, and Geno wasn’t looking anywhere except at him, like Ollie had attained some kind of personal gravity. It made sense, really, because the heat under Olli’s skin felt sufficient to power a small sun.

For a moment neither of them moved, the world receding until they were the only thing in it, and then Olli surged forward and took Geno’s mouth again - _took_ it, like it was his, and that heady idea alone was enough to suck all the oxygen from Olli’s lungs. “You’re so hot,” he gasped. 

“Yes,” Geno agreed. He inclined his head and put his lips and then his teeth to Olli’s neck. “You, too.”

That was enough to shock Olli out of the moment. He pulled back and blinked at Geno. 

“What, you don’t believe?” Geno said, a bit of that tease in his voice. “Look at you, hockey hips—” Geno closed his hands around them to demonstrate. “—hockey thighs. Hockey mouth,” he added, and kissed Olli again.

Olli laughed into the kiss; he couldn’t help it. “What the fuck is a hockey _mouth_?”

“Like this,” Geno said absently. “Good for kissing. And eyes—” He stopped and looked into Olli’s. He seemed caught on his own words; Olli could almost see them hanging on Geno’s lips as he stared at Olli with a kind of awe that Olli did not have the first fucking idea what to do with. 

Instead, Olli ducked his head and began to fumble at Geno’s pants. “Want to look at you,” he said. 

“You already look,” Geno scoffed, with the supreme confidence of the guy who had the biggest dick in the locker room and knew everyone else knew it, too.

“Yeah, but—” Olli got Geno’s buckle undone. By now Geno was getting with the program. He unbuttoned his jeans and let them fall down to his ankles, and there he was, in boxer-briefs with a mighty bulge in the front. 

Olli didn’t get time to stare, because now Geno was working on Olli’s belt buckle. Olli grabbed at Geno’s hands until they paused. Geno peered down at Olli. “Okay?”

“Just wait?” Olli said. 

Geno shifted his weight back on his heels, his hands still. The shift from _swaggering sex god_ to _concerned teammate_ was immediate and total. “It’s okay? You want stop?”

“No!” Olli said, alarmed.

Geno beamed. He closed his hand over Olli’s ‘hockey hip’ and waited for Olli to catch his breath and his calm, and then Geno bent close and said, “You get on bed, I blow you.”

“ _Shit_ ,” Olli said. He scrambled back onto the bed until his shoulders hit the pillow. Then of course he still had to take off his pants. He shoved them to the floor and stripped off his shirt while he was at it, and then he watched, riveted, as Geno crawled up onto the bed. 

Ever so carefully, Geno slid Olli’s boxers down his legs and off his feet. There was Olli’s dick, flushed and full and bared for the world to see. Geno considered it fondly. “Very nice,” he said, and Olli didn’t know if he wanted to preen or cover himself and die of embarrassment. Then Geno bent down and took Olli in his mouth.

Olli maybe whited out for a while after that.  


* * *

  
Olli woke to morning sun peeking through his blinds. He was overwarm and sweat-sticky. There was an arm thrown over his waist, and his room smelled of sex and—well, guy. Geno. Whose breath was soft against the back of Olli’s neck and just barely audible.

He’d stayed. That question had gotten lost in all the kissing and humping and the blow job – Olli tucked away fevered memories of the blow job to consider _very closely_ at a later date – but it was answered now, anyway: Geno had stayed.

Olli let himself sink back into a doze for a while, until Geno groaned and rolled over. Olli sat up, sheets pooling in his lap, and Geno squinted his eyes open. “You have coffee?” Geno asked, with a rasp that reminded Olli again of just where Geno had put his mouth last night.

But now was not the time. They had to go skate soon. “Of course I have coffee,” Olli scoffed. “I’m _Finnish_.”

“Is okay,” Geno said. He patted Olli’s thigh. “I still like.”

Olli sputtered, trying really hard to be offended and missing by a mile. He gave up and kissed Geno instead. “Oh my god, your breath,” he said a moment later, and Geno laughed and laughed.  


* * *

  
At some point the evening before, Geno had sucked a bruise into Olli’s inner thigh. Olli got a couple of catcalls in the locker room when guys saw. Olli threw everyone the bird and continued putting on his gear. He felt good: relaxed, loose-limbed. Rested, even. 

He stepped out onto the ice and took a few lazy laps to warm up. Geno skated ahead of him, head down, finding his own rhythm. The sounds of the complex coming to life filtered slowly into the rink. Max finished setting up an obstacle course of cones in one end and gave Olli the signal to begin. Olli shoved off one skate and then the other to take the hard turns, back and forth, _move your feet_ looping like a mantra in his head. 

Finally Olli finished the last rep and came to a stop, flushed and out of breath. Max skated into his field of vision. “You’re looking good. Can you feel it, how you’re picking up some speed?”

“Some, yeah,” Olli gasped.

“Keep it up,” Max said. He gave Olli an encouraging slap on the rear. “You have to work hard if you want to be faster than Hags. Ready for the next one?”

Before Olli could answer, Geno pulled up in a spray of snow. He’d barely broken a sweat during his several dozen easy laps. “I say you do good,” he told Olli. “Now keep go!” And he gestured broadly down the ice.

Olli felt lighter than he had in weeks. He put his head down, and he went.

[end]


End file.
